Can an "after" job be referenced from a different context?

I think after may not be shared across tmm. that probably one reason it may not work the same way as table.

is this your objective?

I'm trying to count the number of times a certain kind of request has been processed, then dump those counts every X seconds.

I think maybe you can do this way - use periodic after in RULE_INIT, only run for specific tmm - keep counter in ISTAT. I believe we can access ISTAT in RULE_INIT. someone, please correct me if I am wrong. (we cannot access table in RULE_INIT)

when RULE_INIT {
    if { [tmm::cmp_unit] == 0 } {
        after -periodic 10000 {
             log your iStat here, reset value, etc            
        }        
    }
}

when CLIENT_ACCEPTED {
     ISTATS::incr here ...
}

note that the ISTATS counter is not realtime update. see good article by Colin here https://devcentral.f5.com/articles/introduction-to-istats-part-1-overview.Ut34PvL-Lkg if you want something more precise, it probably not good solution

another alternative is, you can do this using static::variable. but statistic would be per tmm.

not sure if this would answer your question though.

Nat